"Say! It's a grand thing to be rich, ain't it?"
"I don' know, I ain' never try it."
"Well, it is; and now that I've arrived, I'm goin' to change my ways complete. No more extravagance in mine—I'll never lend another cent."
"Wat's dat?" ejaculated Doret, in amazement.
"No more hard-luck stories and 'hurry-ups' for mine. I'm the stony-hearted jailer, I am, from now, henceforth, world 'thout end, amen! No busted miners need apply. I've been a good thing, but to-night I turn on the time-lock."
"Ba gosh! You're fonny feller," laughed Poleon, who had lent the one-eyed man much money in the past and, like others, regarded him not merely as a bad risk but as a total loss. "Mebbe you t'ink you've been a spen't'rif all dese year."
"I've certainly blowed a lot of money on my friends," Lee acknowledged, "and they're welcome to what they've got so far, but I'm goin' to chop all them prodigal habits and put on the tin vest. I'll run the solderin'-iron up my seams so they can't get to me without a can-opener. I'm air-tight for life, I am." He fumbled in his pockets and unwrapped a gift cigar, then felt for a match. Poleon tossed one on the bar, and he reached for it twice, missing it each time.
"I guess dose new frien' of yours is mak' you purty full, M'sieu' Tin Vest."
"Nothin' of the sort. I've got a bad dose of indigestion."
"Dat's 'orrible disease! Dere's plaintee riche man die on dat seecknesse. You better lie down."